The use of chat or instant messaging communications in a networked computer environment is well known. The America Online™ Instant Messaging system (AIM) is one well known system for controlling instant messaging in a networked environment. In these prior art systems, two computer users can communicate non-persistent text messages in real time using an instant message (IM) client on their computers in concert with an IM server.
Most messaging services are subscription-based or user-identity-based and may generate large numbers of content followers or users of particular message or content sources (denoted herein as subscribers). These content followers or subscribers can form communities or social networks around a particular content source or content distribution system. Social networks have gained in popularity as people have used messaging as a basis for connecting with each other.
As the numbers and size of the user pool, subscribers, and social networks expand, it becomes more difficult to track and manage the subscribers, the listening users, and the degree to which the users are involved with the message content. Similarly, it becomes more difficult to identify and rank the most popular content items being consumed across a variety of content sources and social networks.
In current practice, content is typically delivered from web servers to web clients using HTTP (Hypertext Transfer protocol). The delivered content stored on a permanent medium of the web server can be transferred via a network to the web client through a sequence of caches. Data caching at multiple layers is necessary to reduce the network resources needed to transfer the content from the web server to the web client. The layered data caches work well for static content. However, current multi-layer data caching systems are not efficient when the data content is subject to frequent changes or updates.